Misplaced faith
by Fire-In-The-Heart
Summary: t's summer after fourth year, and he just watched the thing that killed his parents come back to life. He was tortured, brutalised, traumatised…by someone who desperately wants him dead. He watched Cedric DIE. He didn't save Cedric. And he just…Can't. Anymore. Can't be strong, can't put on a brave face, can't ignore what happened.


It's summer after fourth year, and he just watched the thing that _killed_ his parents _come back to life_. He was tortured, brutalized, _traumatized_ …by someone who desperately wants him dead.

He watched Cedric _DIE_.

 _He didn't save Cedric_.

And he just… _Can't_. Anymore. Can't _be strong_ , can't put on _a brave face_ , can't _ignore what happened_.

He's 15 years old, stuck in a _place that violently (increasingly so) hates everything he is and isn't,_ and he's finally unravelling at the seams…

He… _needs someone._

 _Someone to notice. To put him first._

 _Someone to help him, whether he wants it or not_

Will anyone notice before he flies apart completely?

* * *

Harry absently picked at the fraying hem of the single threadbare sheet on his bed, all that his Aunt Petunia allowed him. And 'allowed' was probably pushing the envelope. More likely, she just hadn't yet thought to deny it.

At that moment he was lying sideways across his bed, with his homework on the floor. His body, from the waist up was leaning over the edge in a way that looked rather awkward, but was surprisingly comfortable.

The reason for such an odd position was due to the absence of light in his bedroom, Petunia having once again confiscated the light bulb. The thin shaft of illumination that seeped under the door from the hall was all that was available, and if he was ever going to get this essay completed in time for school, then midnight sessions hanging off his bed were his only recourse.

It was potions, of course, that was giving him so much trouble. An essay on the healing properties of herbs and the hidden dangers of mask herbs. He'd already scribbled down several paragraphs that probably wouldn't satisfy Snape, but he was still several feet short.

Looking up at his battered wrist watch, which was dangling over the back of the brittle, old office chair which he had' _borrowed'_ from uncle Vernon's garage three summers previous, he realized that it was 11:30pm.

30 minutes and he'd be 15.

15 years old.

Harry turned back to his homework.

After all, he had a birthday every year, why should this one be special.

As a boy of not yet fifteen, wizard or not, he should have been tucked up in bed, awaiting the break of dawn and a day in his honour. Or if allowed to stay up so late to see the turn of his special day, then in the company of family and friends in the cosy living room on the floor below.

Not Harry.

Harry spent his summer hoping that his last remaining family would forget he existed. Better to be ignored than belittled. Or beat.

Harry fought giant snakes, giant spiders, and giant three headed dogs.

Harry fought dementors and death eaters.

Harry fought monsters.

Harry fought evil.

Harry saved people, because people expected to be saved.

Harry saved himself, because he didn't expect anyone else to.

Harry dreamed of death.

Harry was sure that death dreamed of him too.

* * *

 _"_ _Take Harry and Run!" "Not Harry! Take me…"_

 _Quirell's face, rotting to ash and dust, rage filled eyes and evil engulfing smoke._

 _Fangs, venom, scales, and glowing yellow eyes. Vile pain and retching horror._

 _Black mist and tattered fabric. Howling moon and clawing, clutching hands of rotting flesh on stark white bone._

 _Voldemort swells from the black abyss of cauldron lip, like a shadowed reaper, clawing Harry into hell._

 _Green curse became green eyes became green grass beneath Cedric's lifeless body, clenched between his own white knuckled fingers._

 _Hell was where he dreamed. Hell, death, and screaming…_

Harry scrambled upright, paper tearing beneath his panicked hands, throat scratchy and raw as he swallowed the terror back, liquid horror slowly seeping away, but refusing to give into the tears that wet his eyes.

Clutching the ratty sheet to his chest in a swaddled attempt at self-comfort, Harry stared into the inky blankness of his room, silent and still…waiting. Hoping.

Nothing, and Harry breathed a sigh of relief, slowly relaxing.

Vernon wasn't coming tonight.

Whether Vernon heard his nephew's terrified screams suddenly cut short was a matter of opinion. But even if he _never_ cared enough to give comfort, at least, for tonight, he also didn't care enough to beat Harry near senseless.

He'd cared enough last night.

Running a shaky hand through sweat soaked hair, Harry slid from the bed, and slowly reached down to collect his potions essay.

Ruined.

Aside from the rip halfway across the bottom of the parchment, his flailing had also knocked the small inkpot askew, and great blotches of black where splattered across the page.

Snape would be less than impressed, and that great big fat 'F' Harry received every new school year would probably be accompanied by a detention, if not several.

He'd have to redo it.

But not tonight. Not with shaking hands, a headache building behind one eye and Vernon already having let one disturbance go by the way side.

Ignoring the scratch of ill-fitting cotton against the pain that striped down his back, Harry paced across the room on silent feet, to where his trunk was shoved up against the far wall. Quietly stowing the parchment and quills, being sure that nothing jingled or chinked as they landed on the soft heap of parchments and books that were last year's texts, he slumped despondently between Hedwig's empty cage and the hard comfort of his Hogwarts trunk.

Something suddenly occurred to him, and his eyes flicked up and found his watch across the room. Being able to read the tiny glowing digits from where he was slumped said a lot about the size of his room, or lack thereof.

00:14am.

A lump rose in his throat. He'd been 15 years old for 14 minutes, and hadn't even noticed.

For all that he told himself it didn't matter, he'd been counting down to his birthday every year since he'd been six. He hadn't missed even one.

He blinked furiously against the tide of fruitless _anger_ that swept over him. So life wasn't fair. He hadn't cried when Cedric died, he wasn't crying over something as stupid as a _birthday._

 _It wasn't like anyone else cared._

Here he was, 15 years old, dressed in rags that even Dobby would turn his nose up at, sitting crumpled on the floor of his bedroom, everything meaningful in his life either fitting into the box before him, or so far away it may as well not exist.

His wandering hand glanced over something comfortingly reminiscent of _home,_ and his fingers clenching in soft fabric, Harry drew the item from his trunk. Sitting back on his heels, he hugged the bundle of emerald green wool to his chest, a little scratchy, slightly musty and just _too much and not enough._

His 'Weasely Jumper' from first year.

The eleven year old that had worn that jumper was gone, and no matter how much Harry might wish he could still be the little boy caught up in his best friend mothers arms…he was never coming back.

Eleven year old Harry, with his bright eyes, was as much a victim of this war as anyone, as Cedric, as his parents and every other innocent to fall before Voldemort.

As much a victim as twelve year old Harry, with his easy smile.

As thirteen year old Harry with his innocence.

As fourteen year old Harry, with his faith.

And now, 15 year old Harry was to be that victim as well…all that remained to be seen was what he would lose.

His courage? His determination? His hope?

His _life?_

 _Merlin._

He really was a melodramatic little shit when he was sleep deprived and melancholy.

* * *

This summer had been the worst so far.

Taking into consideration that past summers had included such depravity as cat flaps for food accessibility, bars on his windows and of course, cupboards under stairs, this was a rather alarming admission.

Harry supposed he could also say that 'The summer so far, was the worse,' because he still had a month to go, and Merlin forbid it get any better.

Vernon seemed to have lost what little sense remained to him, and the belt marks that bit deeply into Harry's thin shoulders, trespassed down his torso, and over his backside showed that quite sufficiently. Harry wasn't sure what had been his uncles tipping point, but the walrus moustache had been brisling ever since the threatening dress-down Vernon had received at Kings Cross station.

Apparently 'Mr Vernon Dursely' did not take kindly to being told what he could and could not do so far as his nephew was concerned.

The first night in Surrey, the nightmares had woken Harry.

Harry's screaming had woken the rest of the house, and possibly half the street.

Vernon's hand in his hair, and the stinging slap across his face hadn't drawn so much as a whimper from the bruise-bitten lips, but green eyes had blown wide with shock, and Harry had scrambled away in a stunned crab-like manoeuvre.

Vernon had appeared as shocked as Harry, and had approached him with an almost gentle hesitance, all but _patting him on the cheek_ as he ushered the boy back into bed and left the room, glancing nervously about as if expecting to be struck down by the fire of all that is holy.

Harry had half expected it too.

A bit of shouting and the occasional shove was one thing. Vernon had never actually just hauled off and hit him before. Harry had written Dumbledore immediately, sure that his mentor wouldn't allow him to knowingly suffer physical abuse.

The short reply had been to "behave himself and mind his uncle".

 _To behave himself._

 _And. Mind. His. uncle._

It had taken less than a week for Vernon to decide that the lack of consequence was in fact divine approval.

Harry hadn't bothered writing to Dumbledore when the belt had drawn bloody wheals across his bruised and battered skin, or when Vernon's fists fell a little too heavily against delicate ribs, and soft flesh.

Why bother?

He was _never_ going to mind his Uncle.

* * *

It wasn't just his Uncle.

Admittedly, Harry couldn't be 100% sure that Petunia was aware of how far her husband had pushed things. Couldn't say with any certainty that his Aunt was aware of the almost daily belting sessions, the punches thrown at the slightest and most ridiculous excuses for provocation.

He couldn't say for sure.

But pretty damn close to it.

It was after all, quite hard to ignore the whistle and slap of leather on skin, and even the most well swallowed gasps of pain could still be heard if one cared to listen.

Then there were the cuts and bruises. At least, there had been, during the first week or so, before Vernon had wised up and learnt to keep his 'discipline' to areas hidden beneath ill-fitting cotton.

Whatever the case, Petunia never said a word, neither in comfort to her nephew or admonition of her husband.

And Dudley?

Harry was growing awfully familiar with that smelting's cane.

* * *

Then there were the nightmares themselves, which left Harry in an even worse state than Vernon's newly realised brutality.

A shaking, shivering, screaming wreck.

It wasn't the fear, the anger or the loss that cut deepest.

 _It was the guilt._

Green eyes, bright and kind, so like his own. Or Hazel, charming, with devilish spark. Sometimes they were grey, warm and friendly.

 _Wide open and staring. Blaming._

 _All dead._

And the nightmares of course, gave away his every soft spot, his every weakness. And Dudley found them. He poked, prodded, and ripped away the desperately healing flesh with every careless biting word, leaving weeping, raw wounds.

 _"_ _Oooh Cedric! Don't go Cedric! "_

 _"…_ _Who's Cedric? Your Boyfriend?! Oh, Cedric…"_

Harry had decided it was easier just to avoid sleeping.

After all, If he didn't sleep, he wouldn't dream.

His all too human body found issue with that though. And the longer he deprived it of much needed rest, the more issue it found.

In response to the inhumane restrictions he'd placed upon his still maturing mind and body, he seemed to have actually made the situation worse for himself, inevitably dropping off into sleep at irregular, unexpected intervals and subsequently…screaming himself awake.

And that usually led to him cowering in this tiny gap between treasured memories and the only scrap of comfort he had, soft wool gentling the rough edges of his battered mind.

This summer was the worst yet, and that final word, that ' _yet'_ made his breath freeze and his heart pound.

 _But…_

 _Maybe?_

 _Maybe this year things would finally be different._

Somehow, beneath the lingering pain, terror, resignation and hopelessness, he still managed to cradle that tiny ember of hope.

 _He had Sirius now._

 _He wondered desperately if Sirius's hugs would feel like a fathers should?_

* * *

The frame shuddered violently with the force of the slamming of the door, the deafening _bang_ ricocheting up the hallway, making the antique picture frames rattle against their fixings.

Remus sighed shakily, one hand coming up to pinch wearily against the bridge of his nose, moving to press against his eyes as he felt them start to sting with supressed emotion.

The sound of something incredibly breakable smashing again the now closed door was almost drowned out by the brokenly screamed shout, "12 Years! 12 fucking years, Remus! Do you get that!? Do you know-"

Remus _knew._

He sunk to the musty carpet of the hallway, and wept.


End file.
